Includes bibliographical references and index.

Zawiera: Pt. 1. The cowboy way: the essence of the western hero. "Do not forsake me, oh, my darling": loneliness and solitude in westerns / Shai Biderman -- Civilization and its discontents: the self-sufficient western hero / Douglas J. Den Uyl -- Mommas, don't let your babies grow up to be pragmatists / B. Steve Csaki -- Two ways to Yuma: Locke, liberalism, and western masculinity in 3:10 to Yuma / Stephen J. Mexal -- Landscapes of gendered violence: male love and anxiety on the railroad / Lindsey Collins -- Pt. 2. The code of the West: the cowboy and society. "Order out of the mud": Deadwood and the state of nature / Paul A. Cantor -- Order without law: The Magnificent Seven, East and West / Aeon J. Skoble -- From dollars to iron: the currency of Clint Eastwood's westerns / David L. McNaron -- The duty of reason: Kantian ethics in High Noon / Daw-Nay Evans -- Pt. 3. Outlaws: challenging conventions of the western. The cost of the code: ethical consequences in High Noon and the Ox-Bow Incident / Ken Hada -- "Back off to what?" The search for meaning in The Wild Bunch / Richard Gaughran -- No Country for Old Men: the decline of ethics and the west(ern) / William J. Devlin -- The northwestern: McCabe and Mrs. Miller / George McKnight -- Pt. 4. On the fringe: the encounter with the other -- Savage nations: Native Americans and the western / Michael Valdez Moses -- Regeneration through stories and song: the view from the other side of the west in Smoke Signals / Richard Gilmore -- Go west, young woman! "Hegel's dialectic and women's identities in western films / Gary Heba and Robin Murphy -- Beating a live horse: the elevation and degradation of horses in westerns / Jennifer L. McMahon.